Tag Archives: painting process

I came across an inspiring photo of a girl holding a kite and thought… Yes! This would be perfect for the figure painting which I planned to do with a little experimentation. Like I mentioned in the previous post- I was itching to paint a figure… and after reading a few lessons at Susan Harrison-Tustain’s site, I was even eager to try something new. Her paintings were really awesome and she generously shared some tips about her precious painting techniques in watercolor and oil there.

I’d like to record the steps I’ve taken for this painting. So, here goes..

Firstly, I did the pencil sketch of the little girl with the kite in her hands. The sketch was quite light.. plus the bad lighting.. ugh!

Then, using Susan’s technique of ‘yellow’ paint mapping, I painted the whole paper with the yellow paint. According to Susan, this method could give more ‘glowing’ effect to our painting later on. The part with darker tones, we should give it more yellow concentration at the base.

I also planned to limit my colors… so when my base dried, I laid down a few of ‘major’ colors for the painting. Then I put more colors on her hair, face, t-shirt and batik sarong which she wore like a long skirt. I must say I was quite proud of myself that I didn’t ‘follow’ the photo 100% (yay!). In the original photo, the girl was not wearing batik and the shirt’s color was different too.

Then, more concentration was given to the quiet wall…

At this point, I was a bit apprehensive because I knew I wanted to do something different with the kite. For me, the kite was a ‘symbol’. You know, like freedom or happiness… but how should I stressed my point..? Of course, I could just leave it empty and let my viewer’s figured it out. But let’s just say, I wanted the kite to ‘speak’. So I played around with an idea… what if I tried a bit of ‘collage’ work?

So, I played around with a few newspaper cuttings.

A few themes ran through my mind. Of course there were loads of issues in regard of children. I just needed to pick out one.

So,here what I had so far… I guess, my point was to bring across some positive elements for bringing up a child in this world. At the end, we could only but HOPE. No one knows what the future holds, really.

Hmm… I might have used quite a lot of yellow until the skin became quite ‘orangy‘. But there’s no doubt that the yellow base has helped to give the glowing effect.

This painting, for me is still in progress… because I think the shadow should be darker… and the wall could be improved a bit more with some textures and stuff. The hair.. maybe needed some darkening too.

Wow! His works are amazing. I feel I could learn so much by studying his play of colors.. colorful shadows.. and abstract patterns. One of his paintings that really caught my eye was this one:

Nice huh? Look at how he played with the dark and light and yet colorful shadows.. I mean, most people would used black or dark blues to paint dark areas.. but you could actually find beautiful colors in shadows too. Paintings do make ordinary real things- extraordinary.. but not all artists could capture that. As for me, I need to keep playing with colors.. to understand, to improve and to keep pushing my own boundaries.. perhaps someday I’ll find the ‘key’ to a captivating painting such as the Masters’.

Right now I’m working on a new flower painting… yet another orchid. Well, my intention was really to keep ‘loose’ with splashing colors onto the background. It’s not done yet but here’s a few pics of work-in progress:

As mentioned before, someone has commissioned me to do a watercolor birds scenery painting last week. And the client asked for 11 birds.. any kind of birds would be fine.

Hmm..

I brainstormed alone.. then with my bee.. then with my dad. After I learned that this painting was going to be a gift for the Prime Minister’s wife, Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor.. I became.. a liiiiittle bit apprehensive.

See, I haven’ painted much birds before. But if I have to pick a bird to paint.. what bird would it be?

Among many birds.. I would say that this particular bird has been quite familiar and close to my heart. It was a pigeon. Back in October, year 1999.. on my birthday.. there was a lost pigeon greeting me in front of my office in Petaling Jaya. It did not fly away when I came closer and it pretended to run around a little before I picked her up between my two hands.

I checked to see if she was hurt in any way.. but she seemed fine. I left her outside the door and thought she would fly away after a while. But she stayed. So I decided to keep her and named her “October“. The sweet thing could fly as learned later on. But she didn’t fly that far and would come back to the cheap bamboo cage that I bought sitting on the balcony of my 4th floor apartment.

One day, I decided that city life was not for her and brought her back to Kuala Terengganu where my parents lived at that time and let October had some friends over there as there was so much space and it was not far from the beach and so many chickens around that my family reared for fun. She seemed happy befriending all the feathery friends and maybe.. just maybe.. she thought she was a chicken too.

To make the story short, after a few months enjoying her freedom in the State.. October left for good. It could be that she found a new flock of its kind to fly with or… dead somewhere near the beach (well, there was a rumor that a neighbor’s cat had been spying on her for a while). My parents and younger siblings grew fond of her.. so they were more sad than me when she disappeared.

Now, my parents are living in one of the Selangor State’s well-known residential area.. Subang Jaya. But not without plenty of space to run around too as there is this field- completes with a playground, pavements for morning & night brisk walks, basketball & badminton courts and a small surau in the corner- all right in front of their house. Since my dad retired from the police force, he spent much time taking care of the field (well, no one asked him to but he enjoys making his rounds..) and somehow, he managed to summon a flock of pigeons to come by every morning for feeding.

This scenery was uncommon before he moved in the area. Initially, it used to be just leaving the food on the grass and let the birds had a good time… but now, people would stop by and watch as a couple of pigeons or more.. flew and perched on his hand to eat from his palm. Some of his neighbors would take part in this morning event as well lately.

One of the carefree pigeons landed on my dad’s hand.

A neighbor’s kid trying her luck to get one on her hand.. err.. head..?

Thus, back to my painting story- I studied those pigeons.. drew them.. colored them until I could ‘feel’ them. Then I decided to paint the birds at the Dataran Merdeka’s fountain. Yes, the beautiful fountain would be a nice, fresh feature to add in the painting. Meanwhile, pigeons symbolize freedom and they come in many shades and colors.. just like the 1 Malaysia concept! It’s pretty obvious that the painting should convey the message of PEACE for Malaysians.. and to give it to the PM’s wife? Aaahh.. suits the occasion well, I’ll say.

So I’ve recorded the work-in-progress and I’m going to show the sequences here..

But wait.

What about the number Eleven?

My client explained that it’s an almost well known fact about the Prime Minister, Najib’s Lucky Number. Here’s what I got from a 2009′s piece online:

THE number 11 is significant in the upcoming three M’sian by-elections; it’s also PM Najib Razak’s lucky number.

The by-elections for Bukit Gantang, Bukit Selambau and Batang Ai will be held on the fourth month of the year and the seventh day in April.

4 + 7 equals 11

There are 15 candidates contesting the state seat of Bukit Selambau, three for the Bukit Gantang and two for the Batang Ai parliamentary constituencies.

1+5+3+2 equals 11

PM Najib takes over as prime minister in 2009.

2+9 equals 11

PM Najib’s appointment as deputy prime minister was on 6 Jan 2004.

6 + 1 + 4 equals 11

His house address in Jalan Langgak Duta, off Taman Duta in KL is also No 11

His late father, former PM Abdul Razak Hussein, was born on 11 Mar. His mother, Tun Rahah Mohd Noah, was born on 11 Jun. PM Najib has a son born on 11 May

And then, my client said that Rosmah & Najibs’ cars have number 11 on all their plate numbers.

” I see…,” I said- while nodding my head.. acknowledging yet another trivia in my database knowledge of life. Oh well..

Stage 1: After much research of the birds and the background scene, I sketched with pencil and used masking liquid to save my whites.

Stage 2: Light colors for the first layer.

Stage 3: Building layers of colors on the fountain.. to make it seemed closer to the viewers.

Stage 4: Started peeling off the masker and coloring the birds.. one by one.

Stage 5: While concentrating to the birds.. I also built the background scenery in light washes as to make my viewers focused more on the birds.

Stage 6: Refining each pigeons and buildings in the painting .

Stage 7: The masker on the fountain’s water was peeled off, revealing the fresh paper’s original white.

Final Stage: More details were added on the birds.. and buildings were defined more.. so as the palm trees. I also darkened the areas which are supposed to be dark so that the contrasting effect was enhanced.

By the way, do you notice that I’ve made an alteration to the flying bird in the sky at the final 2 stages? Changed the wings to make it looked more lively.. caught in the fleeting moment..

So.. after I felt that I need to stop with the painting (well, I could go on and on.. but I was given a deadline and my bee kept reminding me about it), I sent it to the frame shop… and here’s the result:

I’ve chosen a classy, golden frame for this painting along with a non-reflective glass over it.

I planned to paint this old man for quite some time already. He served my family with fresh coconut drink when we went to his eating place at Teluk Ketapang, Kuala Terengganu.

A sketch is all I have now but I need to do something about it.

watercolor sketch of d' coconut man

My photos references are not enough to show what I want in the painting. I need some ‘interaction‘.. between the man and viewers. Well, let me go back to my drawing board for a while…need time to think…to make it more interesting.. to show not only a friendly coconut man..but a man who is proud of what he’s doing.